


Vaporlock

by auburn, eretria



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Depression, Drowning, First Time, M/M, Pining John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-26
Updated: 2010-03-26
Packaged: 2017-10-08 08:14:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/74538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/auburn/pseuds/auburn, https://archiveofourown.org/users/eretria/pseuds/eretria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He reminded himself firmly how those stories always ended in tragedy for someone, fairy or mortal, not that Sheppard wasn't mortal — that was the whole problem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vaporlock

**Author's Note:**

  * For [murron](https://archiveofourown.org/users/murron/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Vapor](https://archiveofourown.org/works/74292) by [eretria](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eretria/pseuds/eretria). 



> Conclusion.

The fire painted everyone in shifting shades of gold and orange and red. It gilded Teyla, sitting beside Ronon, her eyes dark and solemn, and shaded him in bronze. The Tish woman sitting beyond him rested her hand on Ronon's knee and smiled up at him, teeth white against skin the color of maple syrup. Ronon laughed. The flames were never still, twisting and flickering over the wood in the central pit, snapping and spitting sparks into the night as blackened chunks collapsed into white ash.

Across the fire, Sheppard lifted a carved wooden mug to his lips again and laughed, before gulping the contents. Rodney watched his throat work as he swallowed the fruity, distilled wine the Tish had offered them all. His hands curled into fists on his thighs. Sheppard's laughter sounded flat and forced and he held out the empty mug to be filled again.

Since when had Sheppard been willing, reckless enough to get drunk offworld? Or even onworld; Rodney had seen him have a beer or a glass of champagne, never anything more.

Something was wrong.

Not with the Tish, who were friendly and uncomplicated, and eager to celebrate a trade treaty that exchanged fruit, vegetables and fish for iron ore and minerals that were rare on their archipelagos. Wrong with Sheppard. It had begun well before they had arrived on PXD-433, maybe even before Lorne's team had dug Teyla and Sheppard out of a snowdrift on PX8-98D.

That realization kept Rodney from drinking any of his wine and made the feast they'd been offered tonight taste like sawdust.  Was he the only one who saw just how desperate Sheppard was lately? Drinking on a mission wasn't even the first stupid — as opposed to necessary — risk Sheppard had taken lately.

Ronon was laughing, leaning over to kiss the three fish, stylized like something from a Japanese woodcut, tattooed in black ink, on his companion's cheek. Sheppard's gaze reflected the fire, watching, and he drank again. His knuckles were white.  He turned his head and caught Rodney staring.

Rodney couldn't read Sheppard's expression. He was painted in a chiaroscuro of amber and black, his mouth stained pink from the wine, eyes shadowed. The man was his closest friend, but Rodney couldn't even guess what he was thinking.

"This is all very well, Colonel, but I could be back in Atlantis, accomplishing something in my lab, or even sleeping in my own bed tonight rather than the hut du soir," Rodney complained, half hoping Sheppard would quietly slap him down, smile that tolerant smile he seemed to reserve for Rodney, and things would revert to normal. He didn't like worrying; he had enough worries with keeping himself alive, without adding Sheppard's behavior to his list. "Fruit and sushi are all very well, but did we have to stay over night?"

Sheppard smiled, but it was a forced thing, and his gaze dropped back down to the contents of his mug. "Yes. It's a show of good faith."

"It is one night, Rodney," Teyla said from beside him. Sheppard glanced at her then away.

"Friendship!" the Tish's chieftain toasted, lifting his mug.

"Friendship," Sheppard echoed and drank again, ending up swaying as he set the mug down. A pretty girl, this one with a flowering vine tattooed up her arm and in a red-and-yellow-striped sarong, knelt beside him and poured him more wine.  She balanced with one hand on Sheppard's shoulder and whispered in his ear. He shook his head and she rose and moved on.

"What, not seducing the chief's daughter this time around?" Rodney demanded snidely.

"Rodney!" Teyla hissed.

Sheppard didn't even look toward him, just lurched to his feet and said to Teyla, "I'm going for a walk," then strode into the darkness of the night beyond the village.

"Hey! Are you crazy?" Rodney yelled. He turned to Teyla. "He can't go off like that — "

"Then go with him," Teyla said, low and fierce. He couldn't read her, either. She twisted away from him, so that all he had of her was one bare shoulder.

"Damn it."

With a last, angry glare at Teyla and Ronon, Rodney stood,  pulled a maglite from one of the pockets on his tac vest, and hurried after Sheppard.

"Hey, wait up," he demanded as he stumbled and rushed along a crushed shell path, trying to catch up. "What the hell is wrong with you anyway?"

Sheppard's head turned, but then he walked on, even faster, without answering.

"That's right, that's mature, if I break an ankle I'm making you carry me back to the stargate and telling Carson!"

Once they were out of the Tish's village, the light from his maglite wasn't really necessary. Three pumpkin-orange moons shone along the horizon, bright glimpses of color through the palms. The sky above shaded from faded indigo to vast, velvet black, stars spilled across it like diamonds.

Rodney shoved the maglite into his pocket. "Bastard," he said, raising his voice to be sure Sheppard heard him. The night was warm enough that he was sweating under his tac vest and T-shirt. A saw-toothed palm frond snapped back behind Sheppard and slapped him in the face. "Where do you think you're going, anyway? Damn it, Sheppard!"

Sheppard kept walking, stumbling loosely a few times over the uneven trail in the dark, just a silhouette.

"What is wrong with you? You idiot! If something's — Look, I know something's wrong, you could — you could talk to me about it," Rodney offered. "Look, is it Teyla? Did something happen — or not happen — help me out here, Sheppard, doing the concerned friend routine isn't my strong suit."

"Then,  for Christ's sake, stop," Sheppard slurred as he stepped out of the trees onto a black sand beach that put Tahiti to shame. The sand was powder-fine, smoky and glittering under the starlight. The three moons were rising, cooling into silver-blue.

The beach sloped gently down to a cove that formed a perfect half curve. Little waves waves lapped at the sand, edged in lacy foam. The water was dark as the sky and stretched to an indistinguishable horizon so distant that Rodney entertained the whimsy that the sea ran up into the sky forever and that they were actually in a vast Dyson sphere.

He could just — if he listened closely — separate the sound of the surf from the music coming from the village just inland, drums and something like harps, strange opalescent orbs like pearls brought up from the sea, that sang out different tones to different fingers, ropes of them strung in frames by the Tish to make a surreal music.

The foam edging each surge of the sea against the sand glowed pale, pale phosphorescent green. Rodney eyed it, wondering if the glow came from radiation or natural sea life and which would be more dangerous. His skin prickled, chafed by the weight of the tac vest over his shirt. He opened his mouth, once and twice, and didn't say anything. A few steps and a chasm away, Sheppard stared out at the dark sea and more of that phosphorescence floating far out on it. His silence bound Rodney, too.

He watched Sheppard instead and wondered if the man even remembered Rodney was there. The moonlight gave him a fey look, all the color of the fire faded into quicksilver and gloom.

"I'm going for a swim," Sheppard declared, proving he hadn't forgotten Rodney's presence.

"What?!" Rodney exclaimed. "Are you insane?"

Sheppard had already begun stripping, tac vest tossed down, then unbuckling and dropping his holster and sidearm onto the sand, boots following them. Rodney stared in disbelief. Even drunk, he couldn't believe Sheppard had just done that.

"Seriously, have you lost your mind, Colonel? This is an alien ocean, not Florida! I mean, Earth alone, the dangers of swimming are legion: jellyfish, barracudas, moray eels, poisonous sea snakes, sharks — Hello, _Jaws_ — killer whales, giant man-eating squid, toxic algae blooms, pollutants, octopuses — you do know that the Blue-Ringed Octopus contains _anhydrotetrodotoxin 4-epitetrodotoxin_?" Rodney babbled as Sheppard pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it. "One thousand two hundred times deadlier than cyanide. It's  the poison in fugu — "

Sheppard cocked his head, half smiling. "I've had it. Kind of made my tongue tingle."

"Oh, you would," Rodney said bitterly. "Potentially lethal food? Of course, you had to try it. You never met a chance you didn't want to take."

Sheppard's smile slipped away. He turned and looked out at the ocean again. "You might be surprised," he muttered.  His hands hung loose by his sides.

"What?"

Sheppard shook his head. His fingers moved to his waist, unbuckling his belt, then fumbling open the button on his pants. He bent his head, concentrating, uncoordinated with too much alcohol, biting his lower lip. Rodney felt abruptly breathless. Sheppard's neck was bare and vulnerable, skin pale and moon-touched, cool to the eye. The impulse to reach out, to touch, to ground himself in warm skin was startling.

The trousers just dropped off Sheppard's skinny hips once he'd gotten them unbuttoned, dragged by the weight of his belt, and he pushed his boxers down after them. He stepped out of them and walked, unconcerned and naked, down to the waterline.

When the water curled silver over Sheppard's toes, Rodney shook himself out of whatever trance he'd fallen into and began yelling again.

"Stop that. Damn it, Colonel, don't you dare go in that water! It hasn't even been three hours since you ate. Plus you're drunk!"

Sheppard stopped with the water curling around his ankles, his back to Rodney, pale and smooth, the shadowed hollow of his spine leading down to a tight, perfect backside. Moonlight made him ageless as a carved marble statue. Though statues didn't sway where they stood.

"You never get drunk!" Rodney accused.

Or laugh and let the sound become too much like a sob.

"Sheppard," he said. Rodney was starting to worry about drugs — and how depressing was it that they had been drugged by 'friendly' natives often enough he had to consider it as a probable rather than improbable possibility? "This is crazy. Are you drugged? Are you hallucinating, because — "

He could see Sheppard's flinch.

"No," he said, even as Sheppard walked further into the water.  "Oh God."

"The water's great, McKay," Sheppard called over his shoulder.

"I don't care!"

"You should come in." Sheppard was chest deep in the water. He submerged, making Rodney's breath catch again, then came up facing the beach.

Rodney stared. Sheppard gleamed in the moonlight, wet and dark-eyed, looking like something from a fairy tale, a merman or a selkie. He reminded himself firmly how those stories always ended in tragedy for someone, fairy or mortal, not that Sheppard wasn't mortal — that was the whole problem. Sheppard just didn't seem to acknowledge that.

A splash of salt water spattered his face.  Sheppard's teeth gleamed as laughed. "C'mon, McKay!" he yelled. "Come swim with me."

"Cramps, Sheppard!"

"You're a stick in the mud."

Rodney groaned. "No." He bent and began picking up Sheppard's abandoned clothes and gear, keeping an eye on Sheppard as he did so. As long as he was just frolicking in the surf it should be all right. Of course, Sheppard wouldn't be satisfied with that. Rodney dropped everything above the high tide line and began frantically stripping off his own gear as Sheppard began swimming out.

"No, no, stop that!" he shouted.

Sheppard ignored him again, arms slicing through the water gracefully.

"No matter what people say, Colonel, you're just not pretty enough for me to heroically die while saving you!"

This was ridiculous. He'd begun to seriously worry. Sheppard wasn't like this normally and Rodney didn't mean the drinking. That was a symptom. A month ago, Sheppard would have reamed anyone taking the sort of chances he'd begun taking.

Sheppard was a good swimmer, smooth and fast in the water. His dark head was already far out, farther than Rodney wanted to swim — if he'd wanted to swim at all. He dropped everything but his boxers on the sand and headed into the water anyway.

Despite what Sheppard in his alcohol-induced stupidity had said, the water was anything but great. At first it was almost warm, in the shallows over the sand, but it cooled swiftly as he swam out beyond waist-deep, and soon became almost painful.  Cold enough to make Rodney wish he could simply turn back to the shore, where it would be nice to lie on the beach where the black sand still radiated the day's heat.

Sheppard was barely visible in the cool moonlight anymore. No longer a soft orange, the color had shifted from the atmospheric-interference-based tangerine to a cool silver-blue that glinted off the ocean waves. The phosphorescent foam cresting them seemed eerie and  incited Rodney  to make his breast-strokes deliberately quicker. The water felt like ice around him, despite the movement, and he wondered how Sheppard could stand being in here for so long without cramping up completely, skinny as he was. Rodney's own legs had already begun to ache with the tell-tale signs of the low-grade pain preceding a cramp.

 "Colonel!"

Rodney swallowed water when an undertow caught him and pulled him under. He resurfaced, spluttering, kicking his legs wildly to escape the traitorous current.

"If I die here, Sheppard, I‘m going to haunt your life forever," Rodney yelled in between coughs.

In front of him, maybe 30 meters ahead, Sheppard stopped moving. Huh. He never would have taken Sheppard for a superstitious guy.

Rodney moved his arms and treaded water for a few moments. "Could you move your drunken ass back here?" he shouted.

The waves were getting bigger out here, and the barely there breeze turned more pronounced now that they were far enough out that they weren't sheltered by the small bay anymore.

Rodney felt something move against his legs and let out and undignified squawk.

"Okay, enough. There are things in this water that seem to consider my admittedly irresistible body a ready meal and being eaten by a sea-monster has already been on my list. I'm ready for something new. Can we get a move on, Colonel?"

Sheppard didn't answer and Rodney's glower turned darker still. Damn the man and his issues. Couldn't he have freaked out on a nice, comfortable couch?

A wave hit Sheppard square in the face and Rodney was tempted to yell something about it serving him right, but a tight knot of worry that made his stomach clench stopped him.

Sheppard didn't resurface.

The waves around him lapped higher and hit his face, too, causing him to swallow much more of the salty seawater than he had ever wanted. He pushed the stinging liquid out of his eyes impatiently and scanned the water's surface. No sign of Sheppard. None at all. No dark mop of hair amidst phosphorescent blobs, no gleaming pale skin visible in the cool moonlight.

Rodney's breath caught in his chest. Shit.

The next moments were a blur. Rodney could swim, but he had never been one of the best swimmers, so by the time he reached the place where he remembered last seeing Sheppard, he was out of breath and his muscles were burning.

The undertow was back, here, much stronger than before, pulling his legs from under him and making him submerge too. Under water, something brushed his torso and he reached out blindly, then kicked his legs to escape the backwash current.

It took him too long to resurface with the additional weight. His lungs were screaming by the time his face finally breached the water's surface.

Sheppard, whose arm he had in his hand, didn't utter a sound. He drifted, face down, in the water, rocked by the waves like a broken toy.

Rodney's heart skipped several beats before he could react.

"You don't get to do this to me," he uttered while turning Sheppard awkwardly around in the water. He had no means and no time to check if something was blocking his windpipe, not here in the water at least.

"Damn you for making me remember watching _Baywatch_."

Rodney maneuvered behind Sheppard and slung his left arm over Sheppard's chest, using his hand to push up the other man's chin.

For a few terrible seconds, Rodney couldn't see the beach anymore and bright, raw panic clawed its way into his mind. Then Sheppard gave a rattling cough and Rodney just moved, instinct and the seeing a faint gleam of phosphorescent green in the distance taking over.

He kept up a soft litany of words to distract himself from thinking about how he didn't know what the hell he was doing, and how all of this always had looked so much simpler on TV.

He felt Sheppard's chest lurch under his hand and a rush of warm water spilled over his hands. Any other time, Rodney would have been disgusted, but right now, spitting up water meant that Sheppard could breathe again.

Rodney felt the currents tugging at him and he panted at the additional weight that made moving cumbersome. His right arm, the one he used for moving them, was numb and cold and weak and Rodney had no idea if he would manage to actually get them both to the shore.

"If we die, I will make our afterlife a living hell for you, Colonel," he hissed in Sheppard's ear.

Sheppard coughed and moved his legs, tangling them with Rodney's so that they both submerged. God, he hated the ocean. Hated water, hated swimming, especially when he had known from the beginning that this was a bad idea and now he was going to die in it ….

Rodney resurfaced with a violent cough, gagging and wheezing. The degree of salt in this ocean was much higher than on earth, but still not enough to buoy both Sheppard and him sufficiently.

"Hold still, for God's sake," he rasped and clamped his arm tighter around Sheppard's chest.

The other man's skin wasn't even warm against his own anymore, the ocean had leeched everything away. Sheppard was only struggling weakly against Rodney's grip, and Rodney himself felt his limbs turn stiff and uncooperative. He didn't look for the beach anymore, just navigated by currents and the wind, hoping that his calculations wouldn't fail him. He had no more strength to turn around.

After what seemed like a painful eternity, he finally felt sand underneath his feet, the most blessed substance in the universe for now.

He collapsed into a sitting position, Sheppard half in his lap. Rodney panted, unable to speak for long moments.  
   
When he had his breath again, he tugged and pulled Sheppard the rest of the way up the beach until they were both mostly on dry sand. Thankfully warm sand.  The tide came in slow here and lapped just beyond their toes.

"I am so pissed at you," he gasped.

Sheppard rolled onto his side, away from Rodney, and spat seawater into the sand. He kept coughing until Rodney sat up enough to thump his back.

"I told you to stay out of the water! We could have both drowned! Why don't you ever listen to me? We both know I'm smarter than you. Stupid, stupid, stupid!"

He slapped the back of Sheppard's head.

"Were you trying to kill yourself?"

Sheppard didn't answer.

Rodney froze and felt sick, sicker than a stomach full of sea-water and several moments of heart-stopping terror had already made him. Sheppard wouldn't. Except Sheppard had been so strange lately, flinching away from everyone, sad whenever he thought no one was looking.

Even if he wasn't trying to die, he was maybe...not trying too hard not to.

Rodney rested his fingers lightly on Sheppard's shoulder, feeling it tense, feeling the bones so close under the skin.

Sheppard curled up, his hands going to his thigh. "Sorry."

"Cramp?"

He nodded. Rodney watched the tight set of his face, the lines pain drew in it, the way Sheppard clutched at his thigh, trying to work the muscles there loose. "Idiot," he said, voice rough to hide both worry and sympathy. He sat up, then reached for Sheppard's leg, pushing Sheppard's hand away. "Let me."

Sheppard went completely still, his breath hitching in his chest.

"C'mon," Rodney said. He pulled Sheppard over onto his back, then started massaging with both hands, digging his fingers into clenched muscles.

"D - Don't," Sheppard whispered. His eyes were lowered, fixed on Rodney's hands, lashes long and spiky wet. Instead of relaxing under Rodney's touch, his entire body had gone tense. His breath see-sawed in and out in uneven rushes.

Rodney gentled his hands, aware of the chill tightening Sheppard's skin, the way the coarse hair on his leg was slicked down by water, the hard knot of seized muscle in the thigh under his hand. Underneath the surface chill, Sheppard was still warm.

Rodney's hands moved over Sheppard's damp skin, spreading caked sand through wet hair and over sharp-set knees. Up and down in small circles, his hands finding a familiar pattern on Sheppard's skin.

"McKay," Sheppard protested, sitting up enough to push at Rodney's hands. Except his hands stopped short of touching Rodney's, and he sucked in a harsh breath, coughing, jerking under Rodney's touch. "Please — "

"Please what, Colonel?" Rodney asked, working the muscles under his fingers loose, aware of the air, rich with layers of scent: salt, seaweed and fish, iodine sharp, a whiff of smoke from the bonfires in the village, jungle greenery and decay, the heavy perfumes of ripe fruit and flowers. It moved over his bare, wet skin, warm, but chilling him. Sheppard's hands folded into fists, but he didn't push Rodney's hands away, didn't pull away from him. He almost quivered.

Moonlight concealed as much as it revealed, but Rodney was so close to Sheppard he could see each grain of dark sand caked to his arm and side where he had rolled away to spit up. He could see the drops of water sliding like quicksilver down the line of dark hair from Sheppard's chest to his belly and past the crease of his waist, lower. He was abruptly, painfully aware that Sheppard was unclothed, naked to eye and touch and maybe more.

Sheppard's eyes were lowered, eyelashes still spiky and wet. He was watching Rodney's hands, mouth just parted, and Rodney caught the wet glint of a white tooth biting down on his lower lip.

It all began to come together as he paused, letting his hands go slack and motionless. A low, soft moan slipped from Sheppard's lips.

That wasn't a moan of relief from a painful cramp. That moan came from the same place the recent wildness had come from, the same things that had Sheppard frozen under his first touch. Sheppard swallowed hard. Rodney watched his throat move. Three moons showed him the bird flutter of Sheppard's pulse at the base of his throat, hummingbird fast.

His own breath caught.

He had never seen it before, and that amazed him, that he could be so oblivious — yes, he was often horribly blind to social interaction, but not to Sheppard, never to Sheppard. But there were all those women, he thought to himself, only to re-evaluate. There weren't that many women, not over a three year period.  He just assumed. Rodney grimaced.  Sheppard was Air Force and easy to be around and acted pretty much the way everyone expected him to act, so he was straight. There were so many fallacies there, Rodney was ashamed of himself.

His mind was rearranging who he thought John Sheppard was, while his hands began moving again, without direction. Whatever had happened between Teyla and Sheppard under that snowdrift probably wasn't what he'd been assuming.

Sheppard's breath slipped out with a whispery sound, soft and hitching, that tugged at something inside Rodney. It was such a vulnerable sound. He didn't usually think of Sheppard as vulnerable; Sheppard wore his attitude like armor, but tonight it was all stripped away.

Maybe they'd been drugged, Rodney thought. His hand moved aimlessly over Sheppard's calf, brushing the fine sand away, smoothing slowly warming skin, learning the feel of crinkling hair under his palm. The contact felt good to both of them, there wasn't any reason to stop. It wasn't a hallucination. It was real as the sand under his knees, the chafe of his wet boxers clinging to the tops of his thighs and sticking to his balls. Salt water was still trickling from his hair and his eyes stung from it.

This was real. Sheppard might be too drunk still, too disoriented to know he was responding to a man's hand, but Rodney was perfectly sober. He could imagine every ruinous consequence of where this might be going, from the wreck of their friendship to disgrace and disaster for Sheppard.

He stopped.

Sheppard whimpered. Then he dropped back to lie staring up at the moons.

"John," Rodney said.

But Sheppard twisted his face away. "You're just another hallucination, you're not real, you're never real. Go away. It hurts."

Rodney began moving his hand again, because Sheppard was shaking. He slowly stroked up his shin and gently cradled his palm over Sheppard's kneecap, circling just a little. "It's all right," he said as steadily as he could, hoping his voice wouldn't waver. It shook him. He could hurt Sheppard with just the wrong word, even the wrong tone, right then. "I'm right here."

Slow, slow and careful, like gentling a scared animal, like luring his cat from where she'd clawed her way to the top of a drape at just at the sight of a Rottweiler down on the sidewalk, Rodney kept touching Sheppard. He rubbed his thumb in tiny, tiny moves along the inside of Sheppard's knee, startled by how soft the skin there felt and the shiver of response he felt run through him.

Sheppard drew his leg up until his foot was flat on the sand. He had long toes and angular ankle bones. Rodney scooted up until he was sitting with his knees just in contact with Sheppard's bare hip. Sheppard had his eyes squeezed shut. His chest rose and fell with each harsh breath he took.  It seemed impossible that he could want and need and no one had seen or guessed; didn't they care? Didn't anyone in Atlantis give a damn besides Rodney, or did they just want to go on using Sheppard's gifts, his luck and loyalty, until it was all gone and Sheppard with it? He ran his hand along the line of Sheppard's leg to his hip, waited a breath, then stroked back up to his knee, light yet firm.

The tide was tirelessly climbing the beach. It licked at Sheppard's other foot, still stretched out, and he jerked away from the water, making Rodney's hand slip, so that his tentative touch slipped down the inside of Sheppard's thigh to his groin, making them both gasp.  Rodney didn't snatch his hand away, though; instead he cataloged the heat between Sheppard's legs, the damp curl of pubic hair under his fingers, the firm cock the back of his hand brushed against. If he straightened his fingers, he'd feel Sheppard's balls. Surprised, he realized that he wanted to do that. He looked for the first time, wondering what the hell he was doing, if it wouldn't be more harm than good to just turn his hand. Sheppard was mostly hard, half aroused, darker than the rest of him. He was circumcised. Rodney braced his other hand on Sheppard's raised knee and looked up, meeting Sheppard's dark, glittering gaze.

He wasn't sure why he wanted to go on, wasn't even positive what he was offering and that was where the danger lay. He could give Sheppard a buddy's hand job and they could walk away from it — surely they could — act like it was nothing. But it wouldn't be, because they never had before, and Rodney wouldn't — hadn't ever — thought of doing that for anyone else but Sheppard. He wouldn't want to, so he hadn't. He'd always been as straight as he had figured Sheppard was and this new knowledge of the other man was making him question himself. Because, he wanted to wrap his hand around Sheppard's cock and feel the delicate skin, the weight and heat of him. His own erection pushed against the clammy fabric of his boxers as evidence of this revelation, aching and good at the same time. Still moving carefully, he lifted his hand away and then found Sheppard's hand on the sand, prying open his fingers.  He pulled and Sheppard sat up, until they were so close Rodney could feel his breath — sea, salt, and sour — brush hot and damp over his jaw. They were still for a heartbeat, then Sheppard sighed on an indrawn breath and reached for Rodney, finding his face with fingers that felt unsure, running them over Rodney's mouth in a tentative caress that heated Rodney from inside.

"This isn't real," Sheppard murmured, voice slurred with wine and arousal, and closed the last distance between them. His hand cradled Rodney's face on one side, tipping it so that their mouths met at an angle. It was just a soft brush of their lips at first, tentative as Sheppard's caress had been. Rodney couldn't bear to close his eyes, not for an instant, while Sheppard's lips pressed against his; he needed to see, while Sheppard's eyelids fluttered shut through the kiss that sealed them together. His heart jumped at the first trace of Sheppard's tongue tip against his lips, then he opened his mouth. Sheppard tasted of the sea, bitter and salty, and beneath that, wine and Sheppard himself, evanescent and sweet, while his mouth was so hot.

It went on and on, melting, deep, edging on desperation, until Rodney knew Sheppard's mouth as well as his own, until he could feel the drying salt pulling his skin tight, until the muscles in his thighs and his back ached and protested the twisted position he was in and he still didn't care. Sheppard's hand spread against his back, warm pressure branded into Rodney's skin, while he still clutched at Sheppard's knee, trying to breathe without ever stopping. It seemed like it shouldn't have been so easy, but he'd never kissed anyone who felt more right, and he didn't know if the rush he heard was the surf creeping up the beach or his own pulse.

The cold creep of the tide washing into the sand under them reminded Rodney they couldn't stay where they were much longer. He pulled away reluctantly, licking his lips. Sheppard watched him until Rodney couldn't hold his gaze any longer and looked away, looked out to the sea, trying to catch his breath. Sheppard's hand slipped off his back and he immediately missed its weight, its warmth, the sense of connection between them.

"John," he said, his voice going away so he had to clear his throat and repeat himself. "John." From the corner of his eye, he saw Sheppard's toes curl into the wet sand. Turning his head, he glimpsed long fingers digging into the sand, almost clutching at it. It made his breath unsteady all over again, made him ache.  "Was that — we should — "

Sheppard lifted his hand and stroked the back of Rodney's neck, trailing a damp trickle of sand that made Rodney shiver.

"Rodney," he said, his voice husky and hypnotic. Sheppard shifted closer and Rodney knew he meant to kiss him again.

He pushed him away.

Sheppard froze. Everything locked up. His eyes widened for an instant. Then his hand jerked back from Rodney like he'd been electrocuted and he scrambled back up the beach without even getting to his feet, an uncoordinated effort at escape made unsteady by the alcohol still in his system. Rodney realized if he didn't catch Sheppard before he made it to his feet, he'd be gone.

Gone up the beach, gone from Rodney, gone away and no one would ever find him again, even if his body was standing right before them.

He struggled to his own feet and went after him, catching Sheppard's arm and pulling him close, until they were pressed chest to chest. The shakes running through Sheppard resonated into Rodney's body. He wrapped his other arm around him, holding him as close as he could, hoping Sheppard wouldn't fight him, because he knew he couldn't subdue him.  But Sheppard stilled in his arms and slumped against him instead.

"Look," Rodney said, "calm down."

Sheppard was practically hyperventilating. Rodney ran his hand up his arm to his shoulder and squeezed gently. Sheppard relaxed a little more and lowered his head into the crook of Rodney's neck. Warm breath gusted over his collarbone. That was it, it was just so familiar, so right, to hold on to Sheppard, nothing between them but a pair of annoyingly damp boxers and the sand clinging to them both everywhere.

He waited until Sheppard looked up and smiled.

"We're doing this, but we are so not re-enacting From Here to Eternity, The Gay Pegasus Version, all right? I already have sand in places sand doesn't belong. Also, Burt Lancaster? Never did anything for me."

Sheppard smiled sort of shakily. "That's okay, you don't look much like Deborah Kerr."

"C'mon, we're going back to our hut du soir, Colonel. We'll figure out the rest when we're both rested and you're sober." He tugged at Sheppard's hand and Sheppard compliantly came with him.

They were considerably farther down the beach from where Sheppard had gone in, but the walk back might let Sheppard sober up a little more. Rodney paused and looked around for their clothes. "Hmn, and let's get some clothes on, too. Wouldn't want the locals catching us out here bare-assed."

"Okay," Sheppard said slowly and nodded.

"Pants," Rodney went on, spotting his far up the beach, along with a dark pile of gear, "pants are good."

Dressing involved brushing a lot of sand off and realizing he was never going to get it all. Opting for comfort, Rodney skinned his wet boxers off, stuffed them in a pocket and went commando.  Sheppard watched him, a quirky smile on his face, and Rodney almost blushed. "Pervert," he muttered.

Sheppard would have gone barefoot and carried his boots if Rodney hadn't insisted he put them on. "You don't want to die of tetanus because you stepped on something sharp." He knelt on the sand and slipped Sheppard's feet into his boots. "You can carry your socks, I suppose." Sheppard grinned at him.

"Thanks," he said as Rodney pulled him to his feet. He swayed into Rodney, warm and heavy. Rodney braced him until he had his balance, then bent and scooped up Sheppard's holster and pistol.

"Here, you carry this," Rodney told him, looping the straps over Sheppard's shoulder.

When Sheppard staggered after the first few steps, slipping in the loose sand, Rodney pulled him close and wrapped an arm around his waist, guiding him. Sheppard's steps slowed as they made their way back to the path through the trees, getting heavier even as he leaned more weight into Rodney's support. Once he stopped and coughed and Rodney held on to make sure he didn't fall as he spat up more sea water. "So romantic, Colonel, you're just a regular Casanova," Rodney muttered, but he stroked his fingers along the bare skin at Sheppard's nape, until the shuddering heaves quit.

"Sick," Sheppard muttered.

"Oh yes, and you're going to feel even worse in the morning,"Rodney agreed, not without a certain amusement.

"Tired."

"So you are." Rodney studied him, despite the darkness under the palms, and felt a surge of fondness, of love, for Sheppard that had nothing to do with the prospect of sex. Not that he wasn't intrigued and turned on by the promise of having sex with Sheppard, but he hadn't followed him down to the beach or into the ocean or through the stargate over and over with that in mind. What Sheppard thought sometimes might still or always be a mystery, but who Sheppard was? That Rodney knew intimately already: Sheppard was the one who _fit_. Maybe that was what Sheppard felt, too.

Enough sentimentality.

"Come on, Colonel, you don't want to fall asleep out here."

"Want to fall asleep with you," Sheppard mumbled, giving Rodney a little thrill, despite the fact that they had fallen asleep together in camps and guest houses and prison cells on more worlds than he could easily remember.

It was the warmth distracting him, he told himself, when they virtually tripped over Ronon. He was leaning back against one of the palms, his little Tish playmate plastered against him.  Rodney and Sheppard stumbled to a stop and Rodney stared because Ronon was nearly giggling. The Tish girl had her hands up under his shirt and she didn't even look away when Ronon rumbled, "McKay. Sheppard."

Sheppard swayed and murmured, "Whoa, Ronon."

Rodney fought the conflicting instincts to step away from Sheppard and to tighten his arm around him. He held on tighter and Sheppard responded by hugging him back. Ronon's teeth flashed in the darkness of his beard, shocking white. "You've got sand — " Ronon started to say.

"Shut up, Ronon," Rodney snapped.

He saw the shadow movement of Ronon's shoulders as he shrugged and then laughed.

"Bye, Ronon," Sheppard called as Rodney hurried him onward.

It was getting harder to maneuver Sheppard. He slumped heavily against Rodney, almost asleep, but still open and vulnerable in a way he had never shown before. All Rodney wanted to do was get him back to the damn hut so they could be alone. He didn't want anyone else besides Ronon to see Sheppard this way.

Luck wasn't on his side, however. Now that he was standing by the low red-orange light of the nearly burned down fire, he remembered that he hadn't been present when the Tish had assigned them quarters for the night.

"Great," he muttered and shifted his hold on Sheppard's waist. The skin under the black shirt was warm and enticing, but Sheppard was both drunk and tired, so Rodney put his instincts on ice for the moment.

If he wanted to sleep in a real bed tonight, he'd either have to open every single door in the Tish village in order to find an empty hut, or he'd have to wake someone. Neither option was overly appealing.

Just then, a shadow moved just beyond the fire. Rodney shook Sheppard carefully and Sheppard reacted, straightening, his body on auto-pilot. He didn't however, leave Rodney's space. Sheppard's hand was still warm against Rodney's waist.

Rodney desperately hoped that the darkness of the night concealed enough.

The shadow slowly shaped into Teyla, who walked around the fire, the last embers haloing her, but leaving her face in darkness.

"Dr. McKay," she said, voice neutral. "Colonel Sheppard."

Sheppard nodded at her.

"Teyla," Rodney replied, his voice a cracking higher than he liked. He couldn't read her expression and it made him nervous. "You know which hut we're supposed to use?"

"Yes."

"You weren't waiting for Ronon, were you?" Rodney asked. He made an abortive wave toward the beach path and the palms. "'Cause he's back that wa — busy."

Teyla chuckled. "I know that phrase from the Marines." Her smile flashed.

Beside him, Sheppard snorted, choking back a laugh. Rodney blinked at her then let out a huff as he realized what she meant and how apropos it was.

"I will show you the way to where we are to rest tonight," Teyla said. She turned and walked gracefully away. Rodney had to tug Sheppard back into motion, but they followed, moving along paths lit by guttering torches set at the top of poles.

Teyla paused before a small hut, thatched palm fronds and carved wood like all the Tish's buildings, no more than a single room. She gestured to it, then several others. "Separate quarters."

"Ah. Okay. Well, I know we usually try to not get separated," Rodney said. Sheppard leaned against him again and he had to brace himself. "Anyway, I think I better get the Colonel in before he finishes passing out — "

"Hey!"

"You don't get to complain when your sole means of support is me," Rodney snapped at Sheppard without any heat.

"I think that would be wise," Teyla agreed. She tipped her head and studied them, looking at Rodney and then Sheppard. Then she surprised him by stepping into their space and placing her palm against Sheppard's cheek. "Sleep well, John."

Sheppard sighed. "Thank you," he said, regret and gratitude mingling in his voice. "Teyla, I'm — "

She interrupted, a rare action on her part. "A gift is given freely, John."

She set her other hand on Rodney's shoulder. "You will stay with him tonight."

Rodney nodded, feeling tongue-tied. Her strong fingers tightened over muscle and bone, almost but not quite hurting. It was a silent warning.  He finally found his voice as she let go. "I'll take care of him," he said, "you know."

She inclined her head. "I know." He stood for another moment, watching as she made her way to one of the other huts and inside, then Sheppard listed a little farther off true, and he realized if he didn't do something soon, he'd be carrying his friend inside.

A primitive oil lamp was burning inside, a wick floating in a pool of what smelled like fish oil, but it illuminated a bed with sheets and a floor of sanded, gray-blond wood. Rodney guided Sheppard to the bed and they quietly undressed, then sprawled together. Sheppard touched him slowly and deliberately, until his hands stopped,  one resting on Rodney's abdomen, and he slept.

"Real romantic, Colonel," Rodney said, but he laced his fingers through Sheppard's and let himself sleep, too.

  
The early morning air was clear and sharp, sunrise bathing the quiet Tish village in lemon light. Rodney tightened his grip on the tray he was holding and moved forward carefully, mindful of the uneven, grassy ground.

He'd risen early. The air smelled of ocean, and through a break in the palms, he could see the water reflecting the sun, almost too brilliant to look at, the Tish in their boats paddling out to trail their nets, tiny black silhouettes against the burning white of the rising sun. After relieving his bladder he had stepped into the hut he remembered the kitchen being in. Sheppard wouldn't want food, the hangover would be hellish, but Rodney remembered enough hangovers that he knew how helpful fresh fruit and caffeine could be.

A laughing Tish woman, cradling a toothless, grinning toddler on her hip provided the fruit and Rodney brewed the coffee at her stove, using supplies he'd hoarded from several MREs.

He balanced the tray carefully when he nudged the door to their small hut open with his shoulder. The air inside was stuffy and carried the whiff of alcohol and male sweat. It was enough to make Rodney wrinkle his nose in disgust. They both needed a shower and soon.

He sat the tray down on a small bedside table and went to the window, pushing the slatted shutters open. The thin curtain moved in the breeze and new shafts of light entered the hut, inching forward to the bed and to fall over Sheppard's sleeping form.

Rodney breathed in deeply, then turned back and let his gaze rest on Sheppard. The night before had been a revelation; he might even say an epiphany if he believed in things like that. It had been desperate and painful and as incredibly frightening as it had been arousing. Sheppard wanted him. Wanted him. Rodney never would have thought this knowledge would feel so good. It wasn't smugness, nothing at all like with his former partners, where it often had only been about competing and winning or losing. Sheppard…Sheppard had surrendered to him, completely, without a fight, but it had made Rodney feel as though he were the one falling. Sheppard, in his dark headspaces Rodney didn't dare glimpse into just yet, needed to be needed.

Rodney moved closer to the bed, crouching next to Sheppard.

Illuminated in gold instead of silver, by the sun instead of the moons, Sheppard was flesh and blood once more. His breath gusted evenly, his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm. Asleep, he looked calm and at peace. Rodney wanted to curl up next to him and stay for days. He felt humbled by the thought that he could, at least for a little while, and basked in the idea that it wouldn't end here. They would go back to Atlantis, but there would be touching and being touched, they would spoon against each other, sharing warmth and skin when they were home again, too.

He studied Sheppard, the long bare line of his back, sharp shoulder blades, the span of his rib cage, the hollow over his spine. He knew this man's body already, knew the scar on his arm, had helped wrap those ribs when they were broken, had felt those hands on his own flesh when he was wounded. But he had never looked at him before with the right to look that Sheppard had given him now.

Rodney rocked forward on his toes and rested his arms on the edge of the bed, balancing there, tracing Sheppard's profile visually. Long nose, lush mouth, absurdly mobile eyebrow, all of it still and unguarded for once.

There were lines around Sheppard's eyes, but sleep had smoothed them out to barely visible. Salt glinted in his messy, dark hair, pale like frost, mingled with the first flecks of gray. Rodney's stomach gave a twinge and his hand twitched, wanting to smooth over the strands. Sheppard's mouth was softly parted and Rodney's senses were assaulted by the memory of how it felt to have those lips trace over his, soft, hot, moist, hungry.

Rodney's legs started to lose feeling from the long crouch and he rose, groaning quietly as the blood began to rush back to his limbs. He slumped down on the corner of the bed, mindful not to wake Sheppard.

There was something painfully vulnerable about Sheppard asleep and unguarded. No one ever saw him this way, Rodney couldn't remember ever seeing Sheppard this relaxed, even asleep, on a mission before. This picture of John Sheppard asleep was his and his alone. More memories of the night before surfaced. Sheppard had been downright fragile, all sharp bones and hard lines, dangerous and volatile, yet a man easily broken: brittle. It had made Rodney want to take all the hurt away from Sheppard last night, and he found that the morning hadn't changed that one bit.

He wasn't sure how Sheppard would react to what had happened last night. Maybe he wouldn't even remember. Maybe he would run. Sheppard was good at running, after all. But Rodney knew that he wouldn't let him.

He reached out and rested his hand on Sheppard's cheek, marveling how large it seemed next to Sheppard's face. From jaw to forehead, a perfect fit. Stubble bristled under his fingertips as he moved his hand slightly, combing his fingers into Sheppard's hair. It was warmer near the scalp, silky-cool near the tips. Rodney flexed his fingers, the lightest bit of pressure, the softest massage, just a hint of a scrape of his blunt fingernails on Sheppard's scalp.

Sheppard murmured quietly, still half-asleep, and shifted closer to Rodney, leaning into the caress of Rodney's hand.

Rodney kept up the gentle touches, memorizing the feel and texture of Sheppard's skin, the scent of him — salt-water, a hint of alcohol and sweat and Sheppard himself — and tried to remember the taste of those lips and that warm skin.

A change, a hitched breath, told him that Sheppard was no longer asleep. Rodney moved his hand back toward Sheppard's face and ran his thumb over the other man's jaw and said, quietly, "Good morning."

Sheppard's eyes opened immediately upon hearing Rodney's voice, confusion written clearly on his face. His gaze darted toward Rodney's hand and then his face. "I…" he croaked, voice raspy from sleep. Rodney moved his thumb again and something flashed through Sheppard's eyes, for a moment shadowing hazel into a deep sea-green. Sheppard moved then, scooting up in the bed until he reached the headboard. He screwed his eyes shut again, a sharp furrow appearing on his forehead. His hands went to his head, clutching it against the headache he was no doubt feeling.

"I told you so. But do you listen? No, of course not." The scorn held no real bite, and Rodney hoped that Sheppard was coherent enough to realize it.

Sheppard opened one eye again and peered at Rodney from behind his hand. "What happened?" Rodney hated the way Sheppard's voice broke. His face tightened in anticipation of the emotional blow he was expecting Rodney to deal. Sheppard's walls had crumbled, and Rodney could almost see him trying to erect them again.

Rodney curled his fingers into a fist, cradled in his other hand, flexing and unflexing for a moment before deciding on a strategy.

"What happened? You once again did what I told you not to do." He moved up the bed as well, getting into Sheppard's personal space and ignoring the way Sheppard seemed to try to move away from him and closer to him at the same time.

"So, let me make a few things clear for the future: you're not to take midnight swims in alien oceans again, you don't get to date alien babes, get food poisoning, fly into hive-ships, forget to eat, go one-on-one against über-Wraiths," Rodney reached for Sheppard's hand, holding it between both of his without stopping the list, "host alien consciousnesses, turn into a bug, ascend, cut yourself shaving, break a leg, disappear in a time-dilation field, get shot at by natives, or catch cold." He squeezed Sheppard's hand tighter, fixing his gaze on Sheppard's face. Sheppard just stared at him, which was enough to keep Rodney's litany going, hoping he would get through eventually. "No getting drunk and passing out, no trying to kill yourself in a million stupid ways. And don't you dare ask me why. Because it scares me witless, that's why, and I need my wits to keep saving Atlantis, not to mention you and myself, thank you."

Sheppard's face transformed during those last words, a slow, careful smile spreading over his features. Rodney could feel him relax infinitesimally against his half-bent leg.

"No hallucination?"Sheppard asked and flexed his fingers against Rodney's palm, fingernails scraping over sensitive skin, making him shiver. However, the apprehension in Sheppard's voice twisted Rodney's heart.

On impulse, he lifted his hand away from Sheppard's and reached for Sheppard's right ear, twisting it hard. It earned him a surprised sound of pain and a very hurt look. Rodney just assumed a mask of impatience. "Does that feel like a hallucination to you?"

Sheppard's gave a low chuckle, a warm and hopeful sound. "Rodney —"

"Ew." Rodney wrinkled his nose when Sheppard's breath fanned his cheeks. "Don't talk. You need to brush your teeth and soon, because I'm not going to kiss you again until you do."

Sheppard, finally awoken from his earlier paralysis, moved quickly and looped an arm around Rodney's neck. "Shut up, Rodney," he murmured and pulled him close.

Rodney forgot toothbrushes and alien planets and gave in with a sigh.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted 4.1.06.
> 
> Written as a birthday present for _murron_.


End file.
